*Typing*

In Buddhism, there is a term that sounds like a delicious Mexican dish called Papancha, which translates loosely to "endless mental chatter".

If you were to write down every thought that you had over an 8-hour period and then read the long, meandering mess aloud to yourself, you'd think you had gone as mad as a hatter. That's Papancha. You suffer from Papancha. I suffer from Papancha. We all suffer from Papancha.

I would liken Papancha to a rabbit hole that a single uncomfortable thought or emotion can tug us down.

It might look something like this...

"My head kind of hurts. I wonder if I've drank enough water today? You know what, I haven't had caffeine yet. Wait, I had a cup of coffee earlier this morning. I wonder why my head hurts then? I better take some Advil. I can't take Advil on an empty stomach. I better not eat yet. I'm trying to fast until 2 p.m. I wonder why my head hurts? Now that I think about it, my head has been hurting a lot lately. I better go see the doctor. I'm hungry. I wonder why Terry was so short with me yesterday. He looked so annoyed. Maybe he was in a hurry. No. He just doesn't like me. I've always felt like he doesn't like me. My head hurts. Terry is such an asshole. If I don't cook that chicken for dinner it will spoil. I don't feel like cooking though. My head hurts. I wonder if I should invite Terry out to dinner to make sure he likes me."

There is a Buddhist axiom that warns against Papancha...

"Don't believe everything you think."

To keep from getting completely swept away from all that endless mental chatter, allow yourself to be entertained by it. Think about Papancha as a drunk friend who won't shut up and who isn't making any sense. Sit with him. Laugh with him. Joke with him. Let him have his fun. But, whatever you do, don't try to control him. You can't control a drunk just like you can't control Papancha. You just must be aware when you are Papancha-ing.

Bird lungs are remarkable.

Their respiratory system is designed in such a way that they can actually take in oxygen while both inhaling and exhaling. Because of this, birds are far more sensitive to changes like toxins and poisonous gases in the air.

Before the invention of the carbon monoxide detector, coal miners would take caged canaries with them down into the mines. If the birds started acting sickly––or outright passed out––it would be a warning to the coal miners to get the hell out of dodge.

It's said the coal miners had a special relationship with the canaries and treated them like pets, whistling to them while they worked.

Canaries are an interesting reminder that sometimes our greatest strengths can be our greatest weaknesses. A highly sensitive individuals is capable of marvelous creative feats but this same sensitivity makes them highly vulnerable to outside criticism.

Heraclitus was in line to become the King of Ionia, one of the wealthiest cities in all of the ancient world. He chose to give up the throne––handing the crown down to his brother––to pursue a life of wisdom. He was infatuated with fire and what it represents: Change. The ancient philosopher believed that change was the only constant and to fight against it was futile.

The death of earth is the birth of water, the death of water is the birth of atmosphere, the death of atmosphere is fire, and conversely.

I think of Heraclitus when I catch myself digging my heels into the ground; when I notice that God or the universe is nudging me in a direction I don't want to go but need to.

From time to time, it's worth asking one's self, "What am I scared of changing?"

Pay attention to answer that wells up inside of you.

You will likely never experience the luxury of having your own manager. And so you must become your own manager.

Much of your success will come down to how well you can manage yourself, your mental health and your emotions. Creatives are deeply emotional beings. It's this ability to feel––and to feel deeply––that allows them to create music, paintings, plays, books, poems and so on.

However, this more heightened emotional side of themselves also predisposes them to be erratic, irrational and fiery. While these are tremendous qualities as a creative, they're terrible qualities if you're a manager. Good managers are calm, collected, reasonable and level-headed.

If you want to create a successful creative career for yourself, you must not only work at being a great creative but a great manager. Elvis Presley had Tom Parker. Metallica had Cliff Burnstein. Led Zeppelin had Peter Grant. U2 had Paul McGuinness. Elton John had John Reid. Celine Dion had Rene Angelil. The Beatles had Brian Epstein. You have you.

We have a tendency to hold onto shit.

Something hurtful a classmate said when we were thirteen-years-old can shape the way we view ourselves for the rest of our lives. It's fascinating, really. We can experience hundreds of thousands of experiences––most of which are truly beautiful––but we choose to hold onto the dozen or so that are hurtful, allowing them to replay in our minds until they worm their way into our hearts and callus our skin.

This begs the question: Why do we have so much difficulty letting things go? Bad experiences tend to linger like the taste of sour milk. Accidentally take a swig of sour milk once and you will remember the taste for the rest of your life. If you think too seriously about the taste now, it's enough to send you lurching for the nearest bathroom. You likely can recall where you were the first time you drank sour milk.

Drinking sour milk is an awful experience. We can all agree to that. So, why isn't it something that continues to haunt us for the rest of our lives? Because we're able to let sour milk go. We don't take sour milk personally. We don't view it as fair or unfair. We understand that it's simply a natural process that happens when milk goes bad. We spit it out. We vomit. We tell a few people about it. Then, we let it go.

We struggle to do this with other negative experiences––defeats, break-ups, firings, financial losses, road rage, disagreements, mean shit others says, etc––because unlike sour milk, we allows ourselves to take these experiences personally. We deem them wrong, awful, unjust and cruel. They very well might be all of these things but they're also one of the many natural processes of the human experience. You will experience defeat. You will have your heartbroken. You will get fired. You will lose money. You will have someone cut you off in traffic. You will disagree with your friends. You will be the unfortunate soul on the receiving end of someone else's bad day. That's life.

Living a good, peaceful life is learning to spit this shit up like sour milk, vomit, vent and then let it go.

Sour milk is unfortunate but it's not personal.